Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

This is the 05:32 on 02/12/2026. Welcome to the City Of Stockton's regular scheduled planning commission meeting. Roll call, please.

Chair Sanguinetti?

Here.

Vice Chair Hall?

Present.

Commissioner Graves?

Here.

Commissioner Oaks? Present. Commissioner Crowder?

Present.

Commissioner Amman?

Present.

Commissioner Hernandez is absent. We have a quorum.

Thank you. Okay, and tonight, I'll lead everybody in a pledge of allegiance given that we're changing hell. I pledge allegiance to the flag

of The United States Of America

and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God and indivisible, and liberty and justice for all. Okay, we have a blue card I understand for public comments. So we'll take care of that first.

Okay, Jasmine Peterson.

Thank you Chair Sanguinetti. Good evening Planning Commissioners, I'm Jasmine Peterson with Little Manila Rising. I wanted to just extend an invitation to all of you to some of our upcoming events. We're going to be hosting Little Manila Rising is going to be hosting a flood preparation workshop at the Stockton Rising workforce hub at 27 South Grant Street next Wednesday evening. The doors will open at 05:30, and the meeting program will begin at 06:00. So I just want to invite you all and residents, especially residents of Southwest Stockton, to join us in this important community led planning and preparation effort for floods and storms.

Where is this at?

It's going to be located at the Stockton Rising workforce hub. That's 27 South Grant Street, catty corner from Independence Park. In addition, I also wanted to let you all know that the Climate Action Plan survey number three is out. The city of Stockton is leading a climate action planning effort, as you may be aware. And we're in the final stages of that effort to collect input.

So there's a survey that's open. And I'll make sure that you all get the link after this meeting. I'll follow-up. But I just wanted to let you know, and if you can help us spread the word, the survey is the purpose of the survey at this point is to help us prioritize the 38 climate actions that are being proposed for the Climate Action Plan and help us understand help the planning team understand which of those priorities should be which of those actions should be prioritized for implementation in the short term. So we appreciate your support in getting the word out with residents. And if you can also take the survey, that'd be great. Thank you.

Thank you. Okay,

we're gonna go backwards now to the

consent calendar which is three items involving approval of the minutes from 06/26/2025, 08/14/2025, and 09/11/2025. I can disclose right now that I wasn't present at the 06/26/2025 meeting for, because of reasons that I needed to recuse myself. However, I have watched the tape and I've read the minutes, and therefore I qualify to be able to vote under our rules. So, is there anybody else that I see, well Musgraver was probably there because he ran that meeting that night. But he's not on our board anymore.

So we have four plus me and we could take looks like we could take all the items at once because we have a quorum to do that. And Commissioner Oaks, have you

I have not.

Okay. So, you would recuse yourself from many votes on any of these minutes, but we still leave us with four on as a quorum. And that is there any other disclosures? Okay. Vice chair hold.

Yeah. I would make a motion that we approve consent items for the attachment of the what is it? The meeting on the sixth June sixth, twenty six or 2025 08/14/2025 and 09/11/2025.

That's June 26 not '6.

Oh June 26 hello 2025.

Just so we get it right

for

There we go. Yes. Okay. Is there a second?

A second.

We have a second by Commissioner Pendora.

Yep, Pendora.

Okay. Cast your votes, please. Fifty first. Motion passes, minutes are technically approved now. Okay, so our next, there are no public hearings tonight, environmental assessments, and new business, I'm not sure if there is any. We had one last time, a new business we discussed, but I don't know this time. Okay?

New business.

Well, what's that?

Yes, new business.

So I can read 6.1.

I think you're trying to avoid doing the elections maybe. You're enjoying your chairmanship, think, so. Wait a minute,

you're out of order.

So you know the drill.

Okay, So, staff is recommend item 6.1 is a recommendation. Staff recommends that Planning Commission elect new chairperson and vice chairperson to serve the next twelve months in accordance with standards and policies number one procedural rules for conducting planning commission meetings. I know the staff agenda report has those rules and procedure rules included in it. I

don't

know if everybody's read them or not, but typically what we need to do is somebody has to nominate next year's chair, and that nomination needs to be seconded, and then we cast a vote on it for the next year's chairperson. And same thing with the vice chair. So given that, I see I got some blinking lights already. So I think Commissioner Crowder was first.

First to the button. I would like to formally nominate chair, Jeff Sanguinetti for vice chair.

Well, I'm gonna back you up. You have to do the chair first.

Oh, well then.

Thank you though. Okay. Commissioner Graves.

Is it okay if I nominate somebody? Yes. I really like how things have been ran this year, my first year on the board. I think it's been a year now. Has it? Maybe. So I've learned a lot from you. I want to continue to learn a lot from somebody else who has held this position before. I would like to nominate Mr. Hull, if possible, if you would take that nomination. Just for my personal reasons, I really like to learn. I think somebody who's held the position before, I think we have people up here who do qualify for it and is willing to take on a responsibility. I know for me, myself, I want to continue to be a sponge. Maybe in the future I could possibly do it, but right now I want to be a sponge.

Thank you, Commissioner Graves. I'll second that nomination for Commissioner Hall, Vice Chair Hall to be chair for this I coming concur with Commissioner Graves on his logic. I think that's smart for us moving forward for another year given that experience really holds, means a lot in this. And I think after that, I think after another year, I think other people may be in line that have gained enough experience from another year of service. So, that's my reasoning for second.

We can cast our votes. Motion passes unanimously. Mr. Chair. Future Chair. Chair elect. Okay. Okay, now's the time for the Vice chair. Commissioner Pandora.

I was gonna say, said my name right the last time. I know. I would like to formally nominate Jeff Sangwonetti for our vice chair as for the same reasons that commissioner Graves had said for mister Hall, you come with such a wealth of knowledge. And I have actually grown to kinda like your personality lately too. So I It's a year for

it to grow on you.

You know? It took me him to sit up here because on that side, you know, we've had those conversations. But yes, I would like to formally nominate you, Chair Sungwane. Thank you.

Commissioner Graves.

I would like to second that.

Okay. So I appreciate that. And we can cast our votes. We have a motion and a second. That motion is successful also. So, I appreciate all that from my fellow commissioners. I look forward to the vice chair seat where Terry's sitting today. And then he can move over here and we can keep rolling. And we've got a lot to accomplish in this coming year. And so, we're gonna get there.

Chair, just for the record, I'm just gonna clarify that that nominations occurred this evening and then you'll take your seat the following meeting, would be February 26, Planning Commission meeting, where the chair

So I get this one for a few more minutes?

This is your time. Although, we have no hearings tonight, but you can definitely call to order.

Better watch out

on that one. Dang it with it. Okay.

Okay. So, that concludes new business. Now we have unfinished business. Is there any unfinished business?

None on the agenda chair.

Okay. Reports, communications, and informational items. I know there's some of that that we're going to have. Yes. So, I want staff to present whatever information they want to.

Yeah, is a follow-up

But remember, it's my last night with this, so don't get too far out there.

So just before Scott gets going, I just wanted to you all know this, but I'm just making it clear. Far as this is a follow-up from the last meeting discussion that was discussed, we even had a prior discussion on public noticing. So, we've been quite busy. I don't want to say we can't get to it, but there's the code that we're trying to work on is the comprehensive code update. And we want to incorporate, ultimately, whatever comes out of giving good feedback from the Planning Commission to staff to get that into the proposed code.

Now, obviously, you guys will consider it at some point when it comes forward. You can still have comments on whatever's been created, you know, from this feedback. And even following this meeting, there's always opportunity for feedback on the code anyway. So, there could be opportunities for the public noticing as far as further comments. So, this is not the end all. This is no action being taken this evening. It's questions from you guys, presentation from staff. Don't hesitate to stop the presentation to ask questions since it is information only. So, I'm going to have Scott give you a presentation and then questions can certainly follow as well.

Thank you.

Okay.

You're up. Yeah, like Mike said, this is free form. I'd like this to be more of a discussion. So if you have anything you want to say, just let me know and we'll pause and talk and at the end you'll be completely open to any discussion, so just be aware of that. So that being said, good evening Commission.

Thank you for the opportunity to present tonight. As mentioned, I'll be providing an overview of the public noticing procedures in code. This is intended to be an informational presentation only. No formal action is being requested at this time. My goal is simply to walk through what the law requires, what the city currently does, how our practices compare with nearby jurisdictions, and then open the discussion for your feedback and potential improvements.

So to start, at the most basic level public noticing is governed by state law. For public hearings there are two minimum requirements that every jurisdiction must meet. First, a mailed notice must be sent to all interested parties and to all property owners within 300 feet of the project site. Second, we must complete one of two additional noticing methods. Be either published Can

I stop you real quick?

Yes. I

understand the government code and how you've got it written out, but one of the things that's always puzzled me, I know the 300 feet has been that way for years, but that second part of the sentence, and all interested parties, how do we know who the interested parties are? Mean, we don't notify tenants that are living at the site, then, and yet they may be interested, I mean

All people who have made they even them know.

City they are interested in development projects. So there are certain people like the Sierra Club or people like that nature who just say, we wanna be notified when there's a public hearing.

No. I get I get that part.

And that's

I mean

That's what they're saying.

That's what we're worried about, I think Right. As commissioners, is is Correct. The interested parties could be the tenants that never know anything, but yet they're the ones that deal with the problems. You

guys know that. And and we'll be talking and I'll be talking about that later. But for purposes of this code, interested parties simply means people who have made the city known that they are interested generally in development projects.

Per state law.

Correct. Per per what we're talking about right here. But we'll be talking about

Which is the code for bait. Correct.

So their definition of interest parties is different on who on people who may potentially be interested.

Once again, the state is wrong. Is it I want that on the record.

No no no comment on the how often the state is right or wrong. So after talking about where we at here? You threw me off, Jack.

You only got through one.

Yeah. Number two. Okay. Okay. So we can notify 300 feet and all quote interested parties or one of the next two. You can publish in in the paper according to government code section sixty sixty one which is how how the duration of the publication needs to be at least one day.

Okay. Yeah.

And then the other thing or you can publish in at least three public places within the boundaries of the city, including one public place directly affected by the proceeding presumably on-site of the project. Our current process in the city here in Stockton, we follow those requirements very closely. We mail notices to all people who have stated they are an interested party and owners property owners within the 300 foot radius and we publish publish a notice in the local newspaper, which is the record. We also have a provision in code that allows additional noticing at the director's discretion when staff determines that broader outreach would be beneficial. So overall, we're we're compliant with state law and we do have some flexibility built in when circumstances call for it.

To provide some context, we looked at what other local agencies are doing. We surveyed 10 nearby Manteca, Tracy, Lodi, San Joaquin County, Stanislaus County, Modesto, Elk Grove, Sacramento, Rancho Cordova, and Antioch. The idea was to see where we fall in the spectrum and whether there are practices worth considering. One thing we found is that half the jurisdictions, five out of 10, go beyond the minimum 300 foot requirement and instead use at least five a 500 foot radius. So there's definitely a trend towards casting a slightly larger net.

I'll talk a bit more in a moment at what at least 500 feet means. The another variation we saw is that two of the 10 jurisdictions notify not only property owners but also occupants, tenants or residents who may not own the property but are directly affected by development projects. That approach recognizes that renters often have as much interest in what's happening nearby as the owners do. So again, 50% notify 500 feet, 20% notify owners and occupants that at least 500, that's where the additional provisions come in. For example, a grove, they require at least 30 mailed notices for every project and for rural or regional projects, they expand the noticing radius to 1,000 or 2,000 feet respectively.

San Joaquin County is more complex than that. In agricultural conservation or certain industrial areas outside of established communities, they require a notice out to 2,600 feet. However, property owners of no more than 10 parcels in any direction need to be notified provided all owners with 1,000 feet are notified. I'd I had to make a little matrix to even understand what that even meant. So it's they have a very complicated rubric on what it takes in certain situations. So these agencies, they tailor the noticing to the context of the project and the surrounding land uses, which is kind of a interesting way to go about

it. Versus just the minimum.

Versus just stating a radius.

Commissioner Oaks. So I I noted I I note that you checked with nearby jurisdictions, but did you check with jurisdictions of similar size across the state?

I didn't go out more than the region. You know, we did check city Sacramento, which is decently larger than us. Modesto's a little bit smaller than us. Those are the closest in size, but I stayed regional just to see what the regional practices are. I didn't look in like Southern California or the Bay Area. Fresno, we cities that are close to our size.

Commissioner Crowder? Do

you happen to know if they have better engagement? The ones that the 20% where owners occupants are notified along with the 500 feet. Is there any kind of note of any anything that would suggest that they have a better engagement with their residents within all of these?

So my understanding, I did talk I just I didn't just look up code, actually talked to some people in some of these places. And my understanding from them because I asked about how what their you know, because you can look around, there's not much public here. Right? And I asked them about that and it's basically the same across the board. For sensitive things that get traction, you know, like truck stops or Back. You know, a Walmart's moving in right next to a established residential community. Those sorts of things, you get lots of public engagement for the but for the day to day, it's basically the same

as here. So How about how they know what the occupants? Because that can be tricky. I mean, owners is owner of record, and that's readily available. But occupants are trickier. Right. So communities that

do it.

Did you find out how they figure that out?

So send to what's called the Citus address. It's just the parcel address on record. Okay. And that's that's what they do. And I'll talk a little bit about that in the next slide or two, on some how that operates. It Well, we'll discuss in a sec. Actually right here, I think. Yeah, we'll get there. So so after reviewing what everyone else is doing, there are several potential changes that the commission could consider and of course you guys can come up with whatever because that's what you can do. So one option is increasing the noticing radius.

That would reach more people, but it would also increase postage and processing costs, of course. And it is worth noting though that when you increase the radius, circles are tricky. So area grows much faster than you might expect. For example, a 50% increase in radius is actually a 125% increase in area. So you can get larger numbers really quick when you start expanding radiuses.

A second option is noticing occupants in addition to owners, like we were just talking. Again this broadens the outreach but also adds cost and complexity. Occupant or situs address tend to result in a much higher rate of return to mail, for instance. So you are getting more people, but it's not as the potential of getting it to people is a little bit lower at the same time. A third option is creating additional requirements for specific situations similar to Elk Grove or the county where certain project types or locations trigger expanded noticing.

This can be effective but that trade off is that more rules introduce more opportunities for error or inconsistency. For instance, like that San Joaquin County rule that had all these different layers, it's it'd be it's easy to not get it quite right and then if you don't then a hearing gets delayed and then you have to re notice and it just turns into a whole thing. Finally, we could expand the methods we use beyond traditional mail and newspaper noticing. For example, posting notices on the city website, creating an email list serve, or using the city's bid flash system. Those tools could reach people outside a fixed radius and make information generally more accessible to the public of the city.

However, the con of that would be it does require additional city resources and coordination amongst departments. They depend on doing that depends on the public proactively signing up or having online access.

Commissioner Crowder, how's the question?

Two. One, when they're mailed out to an actual occupant and not an owner, are they labeled as occupant?

It would be. Yes. Don't. That's not currently our practice, so I can't say it is. But It would be. That's what we would have to write on there because we don't necessarily know who's living there.

And did you speak to these other agencies in regards to how are they navigating a news paper notice when newspapers are fairly obsolete?

It's just that's part of state lots of people do it. I mean, that's just how it is.

Now Do they have other exciting kinda out of the box ways of doing that kinda stuff?

Online posting is fairly common. Just putting it on city websites or

When you're dealing though with more disadvantaged areas Right. Or It's it's language barrier to areas, it it's going to be a lot more difficult if you're doing a social media push because it's the kids that are on social media and not necessarily the adults. And that is correct. And the algorithm sucks too. And that's

dilemma that we're currently in, because newspaper used to be, you know, twenty, thirty years ago and and longer, newspaper was very ubiquitous. Like everybody had access to newspaper, everybody got newspaper, newspaper was cheap, like even, you know

They were delivered, man.

Yeah, disadvantaged people still had them, they were delivered everywhere, and it was a really good way to get out to everybody. But that's just really isn't as much of the case anymore. I mean, I

I mean, website

I haven't had a newspaper subscription in years.

I guess my other thought theory was is that does the city have the ability to have, like, one of those digital, you know, billboard things like our outside of the San Joaquin County Fairgrounds where or that's even at the Civic that you can, you know, do a running notice, where you guys could do the big flashes and say, planning commission, you know, and then just something Right. Or city council tonight, here it is, you know, something like that to because we have more pedestrians and more people in cars than we do reading a newspaper or hoping that the algorithm hits them correctly on social media.

Yeah. But it's definitely something worth considering.

Commissioner Hall.

Two questions. One, when we when we go on the record, obviously, the record is online as well. Is it only in the paper when you post it to the record, or is it actually posted on their online

It's on their online paper as well.

So we are getting some some traction from that standpoint. Talked about additional costs. Do you have any clue? Did you talk to Elgrove what that cost was?

Well, the the the problem every everything's I didn't ask them how much it was for a notice.

Just in general, like percentage wise, did they have any

Well, that's the thing, is it's their standard practice, so they don't know what the percentage wise over

Oh, haven't It hasn't recently changed. No. So they wouldn't

have The most recent change I came across as Van Thieken, was a few year That was a number of years ago.

Okay.

So

So you wouldn't

Yeah. So when people say, what's the change? It's like, unless this happened in the last year, it's hard it's hard for anybody

The to pin that other option the other situation might be that, you know, if a tenant gets to something saying occupant from the city of Stockton, they may not wanna open it. That So I Yeah. The idea of people I could see why those are coming back.

Or not wanna open mail.

I Yeah. Because they think it's a bill and they think it's so I'm not sure how you get around that, but that could

A lot of it just becomes junk mail anyway to a lot of people. Yeah. It goes in the round filing cabinet.

Talking about the billboard type of thing, it's good way to notify people of things without notifying people.

We have that bill. I I think that's a good idea. We have a billboard right here at in front of City Hall right now at Civic.

Yeah. That has the running

Yeah. A ticker tape, basically.

And I was just thinking there's something that with flashes and pictures and because I'll tell you what, I I'll pay attention to that board at San Joaquin County Fairground. It tells me it tells me all kinds of fun things. I

don't think we have an electronic board like that.

Could be coming, who knows? You know, with new city hall.

Can put it on the new city hall up top, ticker tape right around it.

Maybe. It does really seem know what you're saying in regards to outreach and to folks who don't have, say, the computers and such. To me, I really think it comes down to a lot of the non profits and those folks communicating on the message to others that they can reach out with. I mean, closer in the neighborhoods and community.

Yeah, think general general community engagement is really how you reach those people under any any circumstance. It's it's hard to to there will always be some group that isn't paying attention to whatever you're trying to do and it's hard get to those people.

It's similar to the one that triggered a lot of this which was out there at the Murray Ranch. Okay? Right. And Hall Avenue was where all this really triggered our bigger concern, we triggered wanting more radius and notification. But I mean, some of this development process requires public meetings that even come before we they come before this body.

Okay? Where I in the old days, I remember we we used to have two or three public meetings, and the developer had to, you know, publish all the all that information and that. And some did a good job and some didn't do a good job. And a lot of those public meetings are like you said. You look around and there's no public there.

Well, that's where I met Mike and Scott. Was that a public meeting in regards to warehouses?

That process is still in place as far as anything going before council requires a neighborhood meeting and that's where the developer has to be the one to lead the neighborhood meeting. The staff creates the mailing list, the distribution list, you know, the 300 feet radius and then interested stakeholders. Those all received the be

also addressed in the code. Right. Okay? Whatever we change here with respect to the public notification for the hearing, we need to also take into consideration the code change the code changes for what the developer or applicant is required to do to be in conformance Yeah.

With that.

So that it's consistent code wise.

So not only I mean, do I think that we need to have more visual displays outside of city hall

I'm going to.

But I also I mean, to your to your statement on organizations and our nonprofits and things, I have found I flyer. Like, I I put my feet on the ground and I flyer, but I also know that's a little, you know, unreasonable when you're talking about certain things. However, you do have youth that come in during the summer. You do have commute people who are in need of community service. You have you do have options to be able to take a three to 500 radius and send a group of people who need community service hours or when the summer youth comes in, Go flyer.

There there are options. There are also options on reaching out to your nonprofits. I mean, a lot of us are very happy to go foot on the ground and, you know, notify people. Some of us have even been known to hold our own meetings, you know, to let people know about these things. You know, you can you can reach out to different organizations such as Little Manila, the Housing Authority Visionary, and they can do, like, email blasts to their people.

So there's a lot of ways to get around it, but it definitely is something that we we really need. The communities were in a time where we're watching our younger generations coming up and they want to be engaged, and they're gonna engage one way or another. So we have to figure out how are we going to engage them. And sometimes I think old school is the best, but I don't think the newspaper is. Don't nobody reads that sucker. I mean, you're better off posting to, you know

I didn't even find one. Yeah. I I

mean, honestly, it it's so obsolete. And then I can't even read it unless I pay for it, and I'm not paying for it if all I wanna read is one little article. So, I mean, to be fair, if I click on it off of social media, I'm I don't get to read I'm not reading it because I am paying for it.

So I

have Commissioner Oaks has a question.

Question. Noel, I have some comments, and maybe they're questions, I'm not sure. But I note that, let me just say that I think the 500 foot radius is appropriate, then but we get into the weeds. What constitutes notice? And it seems to me that you might consider postcards instead of letters.

First of all, if it passes the thirty second rule, that is between the time that they go pick it up to the time they throw it in the garbage, if they see that this is about something in their neighborhood. The other thing I know in Sacramento that they do is that at least in downtown area, if somebody's making a proposal to put an ADU in the back or add on to their garage, they have to have a sign out in front. And it's not just a little notice. It's a very and so it's recognizable so that you know that that's a notice of some change that can affect your neighborhood. And so it's a visual for those so that you might not reach them otherwise.

I'm just thinking about ways to I do think I note that the state law has two options One for that of them is the newspaper and the other one is noticing in three different places.

Yeah, the public posting including one posting on-site.

Coastal. I would I think you should just do that one because

And just end round the paper. Well,

you know, I don't even have to worry about whether the income goes to the local paper anymore, because it doesn't go to a local paper, whoever it is. But just forget it. Anybody who subscribes to it anymore is paying a ridiculous amount of money to do so. And I when I did subscribe, you know, one rarely reads those notices anyway. That's not the point.

The point is that even if that is I don't think it fulfills your obligation anymore. It it fulfills your legal obligation, it doesn't fulfill your moral obligation to the citizens, because it really isn't notifying anybody, and it's costing money. And I know that public notices are probably the only revenue source of any meaning for newspapers anymore, and it's just not a wise use of taxpayer funds. I'd much rather see some requirements that any project, the proposer has to know, there's a fee for this sign, and you should define you know, it has to be so many feet by so many feet in such a color, and it has to be clear that this is the project proposed for this. And then I don't care about if you do postcards, don't have to worry too much about mail being returned.

I mean, I don't really care about returned mail. Your job is not to update addresses, it's just, you know, you're going to mail to in the real estate field, you just go to the title company, and you get the addresses for people around you, so I know you can do that piece. I would be interested I would be interested to see what cities of like size do, because I think Elk Grove's of the world and the smaller cities aren't really comparative for

Elk Grove's not as small as it used to be. It's over 200,000

Yeah, but we have an old urban core. And the places that you have checked with, many of them don't have an old urban core. And I think that is different. I think we have some other challenges that they don't. But, you know, if we just check with Fresno, and check with, you know, one or two I'm not asking you to check with all of them.

I just think that it be helpful to do. I also don't want to overburden, and I want to make sure, but I also want to make sure that whatever resources you spend on this are, A, well spent, and that we don't really care about the compliance as much as I care about the outcome, which is to make sure the people who would be interested in this and able to weigh in are fairly notified. I don't think it's expensive as I just articulated.

Thank you. Commissioner Amen.

I'm gonna go back. I do agree with you about signage. One thing I think I do have a nonprofit and whenever I've had to change something, when I closed one business and then I had to go and do notification, you do have to put it in the newspaper. And what Stockton did here is they just gave me a list of any existing newspaper, Manteca, Lodi, as long as I put it in one of those newspapers. So if I have to go out of town to put it, no one's gonna see it here within my community, As long as it's in a newspaper and they give you that list.

That's my first thing. Second thing somebody touched upon is community. For District 6, what we've been doing is we have three different meetings that we hold every month. It's not the one with the police, but just community safety meetings that we have. Things like this, this is what we bring to the meetings to let them know.

The START program, Ask Stockton app, anything that we have that we can get our hands on, we're bringing it to the community. It would be fantastic if all of the districts were able to hold some type of community meeting, or when the council members have their meetings or coffees and things like that to try to pass it on to get it out there. I think that that would be a really, really, really good way to kinda get the word out on something that's happening within their community that might involve them. If a fast food's coming in, or a gas station, or anything that's been brought before us. It really has been effective.

We've been doing it since, I think our first meeting was like maybe September. We meet once a month, and then we have a larger meeting once a month where everybody can join in with our district six council member. And then the district six council member then kind of, when we report back to him, then he goes back and kind of finds the information that the community is wanting and their concerns. And then we come back and address those things. So I think that if we do something like that, that really gets every single district involved with their council person and anything that's going to affect their livelihood and their lifestyle.

That's just another way I think that we can get out there and that's I don't pay anything for flyers, we just use social media, word-of-mouth. I do incentives, raffle prizes, know, bring a neighbor, you get a raffle prize and stuff like that. There's things that you can do where it really won't cost. You just got to get creative, think, a little bit more creative.

Thank you. Okay, I don't see any more questions, Scott. Is there more to continue with?

No, that's just we were seeking feedback and options and sort of things you want us to look into. Things that you feel would be the best way to notify the public of hearings and hopefully get some public engagement.

Okay, thank you. I mean there's been a lot of good suggestions. I think somehow this panel or this commission is going to have to whittle it down to really what's appropriate and what is, I don't like using the term feasible, but that's a reality in life. And we have to, you know, give consideration to all those issues and then code can present or staff can present and a code to then we can modify it as we see fit.

Yeah.

And then council ultimately has to approve it.

Right.

Maybe just to get a little bit more on distance, because that kind of seems like something that everyone can kind of grasp, right, as far as the 300 foot, you know, radius around the site, which is the standard I did hear from Commissioner Oaks that 500 seemed to be preferred. I know from your standpoint, was there any other thoughts? I'm not sure I I heard quite on

agree with 500.

On the 300 or 500.

Everybody you checked with was at 500 feet. I think that's a reasonable distance. I understand how actually that area gets larger and so there are more notifications or postcards or whatever we decide to use. I really like the sign idea, you know, and how we do the is something that we would define in that. And you know, I can't, I'm happy with what District six does in that aspect and tries to get their people involved that live in that district, but I don't know that anything codified can make every district do that.

And I don't think that's our position to do. It's an idea and that's up to every council district. And then you have a citywide elected official and the mayor, how does that get handled? It becomes complicated. It's great that there's a district that wants to have community meetings and can get people involved.

I don't know how many people get involved, but it is a mechanism in that. But I think from a code standpoint, we have to, you know, we have to meet the minimum law requirement, number one. And we're not gonna change state law even though it needs changing, okay? And that but we have to meet that legally on that so that things aren't challenged on what we do in that. And then we can go beyond that. Given the start that we've done on it, I kind of agree with Commissioner Oaks. I mean I'd like to see, put the list up. I didn't see Modesto in there.

Modesto's on there.

Is it? Yeah, Modesto. Okay. I was probably seeing not. Fresno's not there and then you have, I mean Rancho Cordova is a Sacramento suburb and Elk Grove is basically a suburb of Sacramento. And they are large communities. But Elk Grove's relatively new, old core like us. Modesto is old core. Fresno is old core. You could use Clovis, which has a pretty good sized population. But it's kind of like Elk Grove, it's relatively new suburb of the Fresno area.

About is Ripon, Lathrop, are those more for those counties?

No. They're they're incorporated. I left out, as far as the county goes, I left out Ripon, Lathrop, and Escalon just because they're much smaller.

Okay. Because I know, like, Rippin I have my husband's friend lives out there and I know that they do they promote everything off of a sign that they have. So, like, if they're doing a parade, it's off

of their Right.

And Rippon's actually a a very tight knit community. It's Yeah. It's it's crazy over there. I have a couple friends that are from Rippon, and, like, they know everything about everybody at that time.

Well, Pacifica is the same way.

Right? So

Pacifica, their city hall, first of all, looks like it belongs in a little strip mall because I actually went walking through the city of Pacifica the other day or a couple weekends ago. And first of all, it's like it looks like a little law office which cracks me

up.

Escalon's the same way.

But they have such community pull. Like, they're they everybody out there, when you go into a business, they're talking to you like, do you live around here? We have a meeting coming up and they wanna talk about this and this and we're not allowing Airbnb's and whoop whoop. And I'm like, well, tell me more how you do all this. You know? And I'm just like, I wanna know. Like, I found little tiny homes hanging out out there. I was like, oh my god, taking pictures and sending them to people. So, I mean, we are I tell people all the time we are probably one of the biggest little towns that I have ever encountered, and that says a lot. I've been to Reno.

I've been to Vegas, I was raised in Oregon. So but I don't think it's unheard of. And I think 500 feet is more than adequate. Obviously, you would not include the random county pockets that we have throughout the city. Is that correct? So, like, if that 500 foot radius goes out and it encompasses, like, a small little part of the county pocket that we have, you know, they obviously wouldn't receive the mailer.

Why wouldn't they? Or Why wouldn't they?

Well, I'm not saying or would they?

Yes. They do. So the

hold on. State law. Get

back up to that slide.

There's nothing in the state law that that restricts it to in your municipality when it comes to the mailed notice.

Okay. That and that was nothing I wouldn't have seen then. I learned something new today.

K. Commissioner Amen. When I first brought this in September, the reason that this was a big deal for me is from the constituents that came. And the 300 radius only hit two homes. And because they were a close knit street, they were able to go and rally the rest of the neighbors down the street.

Had that not happened, then more than likely it would have been the opposite outcome. And, I am I think I said 700 when I asked you to look at it, but maybe that was a bit much, but I think for me I'm more for the 500 or more. I know when I asked you would it be different in a residential versus industrial that maybe borderlines residential, I know that some areas are gonna be different. And I was very surprised to find out that only the owners of the buildings or property were being notified, not the actual occupants or the renters of those buildings or grocery stores, fast food, whatever it may be, that's going to be affected by something coming in like a cannabis place or something like that. They were clueless.

They came here before us and didn't have a clue. So that's why this is so important to me that we are able to make sure that we are notifying all occupants within a larger range, and we're also getting to more people so that they have a chance to come in this room and speak, and say how they feel. Doesn't necessarily mean it's gonna always go our way, but I heard what they said. I've read the letters that have been sent to us and I think that I just felt a pull to try to have this. That's why I asked if you could kind of explain this because I looked it up on my own and it's kind of overwhelming.

I'm glad you did that. I was nowhere gonna do slides like that. But I think for me, it would be 500 or more. The more would be basically basically giving giving the the situation in the area. And for me it's always gonna be businesses and residential and renters of those businesses to make sure that everybody's covered and they have a voice. For me that's the big thing that they have a voice.

Thank

you. I'm gonna expand just a little bit on that. I concur the 500 feet. I concur with a lot of what you said Yolanda. I think if you put our code up, okay, so we elect one and two and then we have a code section of our own that allows the director to do additional things if she determines or he determines that it's necessary.

And I think that's also a good point that needs to remain in the code to have the director have that type of authority in that. With everybody else so far that said about the newspaper. Know that there's projects over the years that have used signs and said future home of such and such at this site and they post it right there and they have a, you know, an architectural drawing of what's being proposed and everything. I've seen them for years, okay, on certain projects. And I think that's a good thing to have, okay?

That somebody knows what's coming to this vacant property in that. I mean we're talking about mainly vacant properties or uses, use permits of businesses in that. And so those could be also posted in that. And as far as using the newspaper, think that's out the window in that. I think, you know, placing it in public spots would still put us in compliance with state law in that and using that part.

And the city can post something here. I mean you go to the county's administration building, they post all the meetings in their glass cabinet and have it. I mean there's no reason we can't post what somebody's proposing inside a glass cabinet identifying, okay, there's a proposed project here, and we post it at the site, and then we pick somewhere else locally in the community, and we post it, and we can meet the state standards minimum. And then include the director in code that can make determinations in that based on sensitivity. There are sensitive projects that need to be notified at a larger maybe even greater than 500 feet.

And that ought to be, you know, up to the director based upon, you know, considerations given for certain a menu of consideration. What type of project it is, what neighborhood it's going into. We know our neighborhoods. We're supposed to know our neighborhoods. We're supposed to know where we got certain things going on in that, and where we may have trouble spots, if you want to use that term.

And maybe we need to expand that. And so, we need maybe we put a menu of things that the director has to give consideration to, to expand what is outright spelled in a code. Vice Chair

Hall. Yeah, going in a lot of different directions right now. Could I suggest that we could have staff come back to us with a proposal? A lot of good ideas. We could go on forever.

Wait.

So but I thought we have I think we're kind of agreeing about 500 feet. Sounds like consensus is happening there. And obviously, the the occupant really is kind of the other consensus. How you get to that occupant, I guess, is the question. Yeah. So but, you know, certainly, the newspaper is an issue, but I don't know how you get around that. But but mailing to both the owner, that could be someone that's not in in town, obviously, and it's a renter, and the occupant seems like it makes the most sense. This is just a suggestion that they come back with a variety of different

They're options for gonna come back to us with something with a variety, and we're just making some suggestions of our concerns And right that of different options. And yeah, they are all over the plate right now. But that's for them to come back to us with a recommendation of what they think of what we're telling them here tonight. And as far as the item of getting away with the newspaper, Terry, is the law allows us to get away from the newspaper. Put state law back up.

We have to pick item two, we have to pick one of those two bullets. And so, if we use the second bottom bullet, we eliminate the newspaper section.

Right. Ten years ago, I would have argued that it's disingenuous to use the second one. But now I think it's disingenuous to put

it in the paper. It's obsolete, kind of like the DMV code, parts of the DMV code, they're obsolete.

Yeah, so we can certainly create a process where the applicant would have to ensure that whatever gets posted on the property remains on the property because as most know, you know, things tend to get taken if it's, you know, on a stake or something with signage and that has to be up the entire time for that posting period.

Yeah, things can get to Those

are all considerations. Right.

Yeah, but you know, if you have it on the property, you have it here, you've got two out of three. You've met

two of the three.

Put it

on a billboard and then you got your three. Still on the billboard, telling you.

It's not on the website.

We're on

Right, we'd have to come up with some parameters as far as the size of whatever gets posted. I imagine we'll have to come up with some details just to kind of at least provide minimums, right, for because I'm sure somebody might be a little sneaky and post something very small postage stamp size. So we're going

to have to

create, yeah, the qualifiers for it.

And how we handle graffiti that's going to happen on them and Yep,

Scott mentioned that too, yeah.

I mean Terry mentions that. So I mean that's a reality around here. Commissioner Amen had a

question. So looking at this, if we it would basically look like 500 feet, and then if we were to eliminate the first one of the newspaper, and then it would be at least three public places after that. And can you do the next slide? What was the next one?

Next slide is what we do.

Okay. So, would this then be mail property owner within 500 feet of interested parties? Would that then make that last statement of additional notice that the director determines? Would that be the more? Yes. So

anything above what our standard is would be covered under that that third option So

500 feet and more, that would basically be the more.

Yeah.

Based on the director's determination if you need to reach out Right. Is that right?

Yeah, and I liked and I'm not sure that it was actually really clear, I like the idea of what you said is and in that section we should you know give the director you know opportunity and then some factors to consider would be you know.

A menu.

Yeah a menu of things that might actually I also think it protects the director from, you know, the director says, look, I've looked, here's why I did it or here's why I didn't do it, it didn't fall within

the It leaves some protection and protects the city and the director and it gives some direction of why she has the authority to do this. They're looking because of this, and these are some of the options that need to be given consideration. And that people know

that they've been treated fairly.

Yeah, Murray Ranch you brought up was a good example of picking up four properties, but they were large properties, right? So that's why it only picked up four. But it would be logical, say, under the director's call, to say, Hey, we've got to at least pick up the rest of the neighborhood. It makes sense, right? Immediately adjacent to, you know, the project site and it just makes sense to pick up the neighborhood.

Well, and in response to that, they haven't come to a public hearing yet, but they haven't had a neighborhood meeting, the Woody project, to the north of Murray Ranch. We determined, because of the Murray Ranch project, we invoked this extra section and we had, for the community meeting, they had to notify everybody on on haul, like on haul all the way out to Mariposa and on learn it all the

way out

to Mariposa.

And section.

Right. So that's part of the nice thing about this flexibility is we can say, no, no, you have to do this. It's not, it would be nice if you could, it's you will be doing this.

Well, and we have cannabis thing uses that come up and that. And we may you know, I mean, like the shopping center on West Lane and Marsh Lane, the 300 foot, well, it didn't reach a lot of places, okay, that had concerns and stuff. And so there there's gotta be some flexibility to where a director can say, okay. This could be a sensitive item. I wanted to extend it a little bit further and I want these things given consideration and notified. Yeah. We live in that world today.

Can I just say that I when you do the community meetings, do they go out like a bid flash on because I never get noticed notified from the Ask Stockton app when there are community community meetings meetings or anything of that nature? I don't receive anything

from the

Ask So the community meeting parameters for noticing mirror closely our public hearing noticing requirements. So it went out to the mail went out to people nearby Mhmm. People who have declared themselves as interested parties, but it didn't it didn't do a a citywide bid flash or anything.

It does oh, okay. So is there a way though because, I mean, I may not live out there, but maybe I wanna go here. Know, I mean there are organizations like, you know, that would probably, you know, that where their span reaches out that way and they may not know that that's coming. Is it something that we can put these, you know, neighborhood meetings on? You know, and I know that that is one of our residents who, you know, attends almost every one of our meetings.

That's one of her things is that we're not getting notified via the Ask Doctor. NAP when there are things like that. Or like when the warehouse thing, warehouses go out and you have those meetings, I would never have known if I hadn't known somebody here to go to those meetings. So it would make sense if Ask Stockton would put out when there are you know public meetings and neighborhood meetings of sorts.

Yeah that's something they'll come back to us with and give us these options and then we can choose from.

Yeah, that's something for sure. You know, we have a public outreach depart or not department, but part of the city manager's office, OPTIC. And we are definitely trying to work with Optic because they're a newer group, you know, that was established not too long ago. And we're seeing that, at least from the social media side of being an outlet for people monitoring Ask Stockton, you know, all the different sources. You can sign up for different subscriptions, you know, not paid. I don't think they're paid subscription, but subscribers to whatever topics, you know, that they're interested in. So that's definitely an area that we see has to be a part of this. And I'm glad you're seeing that, too.

When we talked about having signage out, big signs, you said, not small ones, but big signs when something's going on, would basically, let's say someone's putting up fast food, I hate to say that word, but would whoever's putting that there, is that their responsibility to pay for those signs, not us, not the Yeah,

we haven't seen any

We would have to drop They

would come back to us with a code and spell out what they think the requirements and then we'd listen to that. If we thought more needed to be done or less needed to be done, it'd be our call. But right now we're just giving them ideas.

No, was just asking who would pick up the cost of that. Yeah,

A regulation that you draft would most likely be is on the applicant to apply the signs

to the doesn't pay for anything. Okay. Well, or it's

gonna come through the application price. It's it's

would be it would be on another

to provide proof.

The city doesn't pay proof.

But it's better the applicant, they have an interest, right, as far as following the regulations and keeping Taking

into account in their proposal and when they pencil out whether it's worth doing it.

Yep.

So I think you've kind of got a mission ahead of you.

I do.

Because we've got a lot to do this coming year with respect to finishing this code up. There's a lot more to it than just this item.

This

is We just a hot also have the item we discussed at the last meeting regarding what we felt based on Mary Elizabeth's comments were that we wanted some information about, I think the director took some good notes somewhere. So we'd like to hear what you guys have based on that so that we can address when she's back at our next meeting if we need to.

Okay, that's fine. Okay. Yeah. I mean I can tell you with certainty we're in communication with the city manager's office in regards to that issue. It is not as simple as just pulling something together. This data is something that we're going to have to work to try to create, you know, a source for pulling that information.

That's not an issue, Mike.

Yeah. Issue is

being able to tell her that, and hear it from staff.

Right.

That the commission asked you to do this, and you're taking this on, and you're working on coming So that we don't have to keep hearing it every meeting.

Right, yeah. Wheels are in motion.

Yep. That's what I want to be able to, or Terry will, or if he doesn't, I will as Vice Chair, I'll ask for that as a comment, okay, from staff so that I don't have to keep hearing it. Okay. That's the whole purpose of it. Just like we talked about.

Anyway, I think we've given you a lot of good information to look into regarding our notifications. And you've done a good job coming back to us with what you've got put together in that. And now we can just keep moving forward and we'll come to something that will bring us into the twenty first and twenty second century hopefully.

All right, thank you very much. Okay,

appreciate the informational time and everything you guys have done. So with that we're gonna move on to item 8.1 Michael.

That was the one we just did. Okay.

So we're So that's all you have on Yep. Eight point Okay, we're not going to talk about more of the code.

No, not at this point in time.

All right. So now we go to item nine, commissioner comments. I'm going to start off since this is my last chairmanship meeting. Off, I want to thank all my fellow commissioners for giving me the opportunity to lead the group in that for this past year as far as leading the meetings in that and allowing everybody to air out whatever they want to say. And I appreciate the vote of confidence to put me in a vice chair for the following year and putting another experienced person in chairmanship so that we can keep moving forward with the good deeds that we're trying to accomplish.

The second thing I want to say is I want to thank staff for doing a great job for this past year. That I think that you guys do a good job in that, a great job in that, and coming to us with the information and sometimes listening to us ramble on about things that you probably don't even want to hear from us about. But you do a good job and have patience to listen to us in that. And I appreciate that. And I'm looking forward to another year and getting some things accomplished.

I'd like to finish up things and begin some new things that we need to do. We need to, I don't like using the term, improve our city, but the reality is we need to bring our city back to earlier times when we didn't have all conflicts that we have going on and we can help our citizens of this community improve their lives. And we can do that through some of the rules that we put together and we need to do that. We need it bad. We need to bring people good jobs.

We need to plan things for our future that will bring and keep our population kids here instead of them wanting to leave the community and even keep people like me that was lived all my life here in that. And sometimes I get so frustrated I want to just sell everything everything and leave in that. I don't want to be that way. This is where I was raised. I had a lot of fun.

I've been for all intents and purposes in that. I had a good life here in that. And I want to see that my family stays here, and I finish my life here in that. And so, anyway, again, that's my goal is maybe I can help commission and your staff to make things better around here, and that's why I do this. Anyway, thank everybody. Commissioner Graves looks like he was first in line.

Yeah, I have a question for staff and thank you for serving. Learned a lot and we'll continue to learn from everybody up here. Two questions, everything that we were just saying in the last item, I respect and I love all the input. For staff. Do we have a social media for the planning commission?

Like, Instagram, Facebook, you know, because I see a lot of things that get approved here. And then, know, for example, Spanos West project probably about six to nine months ago, you know, when they came before us and they said they were gonna build an In N Out Burger and Dutch Bros and stuff like that. That just got announced on social media last week and it was a big deal. I think that, you know, we knew about that and I probably could have used my platform to put it out there where I didn't want to because I don't do that, but I think just to get information out to the community, if we started our own platform maybe or if we had those resources that when something gets approved here or even just the littlest of things, that could be an outlet because the record is an outdated source and everybody doesn't use it anymore. Media has changed.

So just a recommendation of you guys or anybody up here wants to think about that one day, that serves all the districts. Something gets approved here tonight, they talked about instead of 300 feet, 500 feet, boom. To the next one it could, this is just information and then it just gets a different form of media with just direct facts. That's just a thought. Second thing, I don't know who to ask with this one.

When I was a kid, 12, 13 years old, charred away, part of it got renamed to Martin Luther King. How does that happen if it was something, another street in Steinfeld, California in the city limits, a proposed name change for a street? Would I bring that before the planning commission, put that on the agenda, talk to somebody else, go down to city hall? What would I do in that situation?

There's a process for that. It's actually in the development code. And we've had a few streets come in through this process that goes through the planning commission and ultimately to city council for street naming or renaming, I should say, because that in that case it was street renaming. Seek Temple Street was the last one I remember that was done near the Seek Temple, as you might expect, but it was a portion of Grant Street. That was the former name of a portion of the street that ended at DMLK.

And so, south of there was renamed to Sikh Temple Street. But it went through a process, there were meetings. In this case, there was meetings out at site at the Sikh temple where it was neighborhood meetings for folks that were going to be affected by the name changes. You might expect, you know, people have to change their addresses. It's, you know, I don't want to say harmful, but it's sensitive, you know, as far as to folks that have to go through that process. So surprisingly, both of them, you know, especially SIG Temple Street, you know, made it through the process and the neighborhood got behind it.

There

is So I'm glad they did, that's the oldest

What's that?

I'm glad they did, it was the oldest Seek Temple in America, right? What's that? First one in America, or the oldest one in America?

Yeah, in, I think The US, it might have been the first one in the don't want be an heir, so I'm going to say I think. But that's my understanding, is I believe it was the first settled church for Sikh Temple in The U. S. In Stockton, it ended up. So, yeah, that's got some history. But just to get back to the process, Terren, did it look like you wanted to say something?

Oh, Chair, if I may. I was just going to let you know the municipal code section in case you wanted the exact code. It's 16.16, and then if you have any

additional 16.1?

Sorry, 16.16, so 160. Street name changes, so if you have additional questions, I'm sure staff will follow-up. If you want to look at the code first, first, just so you have the section.

Thank you. Yeah, appreciate it. By all means.

Thank you, Commissioner Graves. Commissioner Amen.

I'm gonna say something else, but I'm gonna piggyback what you said. I guess to follow-up with what you said about things that happen here, how do we get it out? Because I know a lot of things that we do here, vote on, but it still has to go to counsel, correct, to get approved. So, if we were to put something out, we obviously, will we have to wait for counsel to approve it and then will we be able to comment? Because if we put something out there, then they say no. How would that work?

Well, would think, my perspective, you would put out there that, say, if you're approving a recommendation to city council, that's how it should be Female Worded. Promoted. Okay. Far as you approved a recommendation on whatever it is city council. If we're going to say put something out there through social media or whatever, I would say that would be the approach that should be taken so it's very clear.

Now, use permits, for example, those are approved by the Planning Commission. They are subject to an appeal, so someone can always file an appeal for it. But you can certainly, I would think and again, we need to work with our city manager's office and OPTIC, you know, that would be a part of that. But it's something we can consider, but I would think, yeah, I wouldn't see a harm in promoting, you know, whatever the Planning Commission decisions are.

So we wouldn't have to wait. We just have to be careful on the wording that we Yeah, can

we have to make sure that it's accurately reflected.

Whether it's a recommendation or approval. There's some tentative maps that we approve without council authority if they're already within the city.

Right.

And that, but if they have to be annexed then we're recommending, we approve the tentative map but it's not effective until it's actually annexed through LASCO. So we have to spell it out, what we actually proved and when it becomes effective and maybe it won't ever become effective.

And it can be many things, not just annexation. So zoning amendments, plan amendments, those are all if you could be in city limits and go through that process. But ultimately it's not approved until council really approves that

item. I

like that idea.

Yeah, just all we have to put in the caption was waiting for council approval. Know something like that but I'm gonna be quiet now.

There's a lot of young kids, I mean the young kids and the

youth uses the social media but there's other people that don't use social media so there's that balance too.

Through the chair. So in regards to publicizing actions of the planning commission, I of went to Assistant Director McDowell stated a ago, I would like to confer a city manager's office to get direction on how that messaging should come across. And then we would be happy to report back once we get some direction on that. Because I can see potential outcomes one way or another that may cause confusion where people think it's approved and then it gets denied or gets denied and then it gets appealed. So I think we have to think of some of those nuances and then we can get some guidance and come back and talk about it.

For the wording, okay. Thank you. Okay, now can I make my regular comment? I just wanted to piggyback because I really like that idea. First, congratulations to both of you. I'm kind of just learning from you guys. You guys have been doing this for a long time. So I'm really excited. I'll still be able to sit here and pick your brains and just learn more about what the seat really means. I'm really excited about that. I did have a question though. I, when when, I don't know what I was expecting last year. I don't know if I was comparing it to city council's agenda. I probably should not have. And I look at other agendas on other different measures and stuff.

Are we gonna be doing, what's the word, I think more this year? I don't know, was thinking sometimes we're here, we might have one agenda item and we might have two agenda item. I was thinking, maybe they're just being light with us a little bit because we're new. A majority of us were new last year. So I'm just wondering, I think I'm just eager to do more. And I don't know what cushion I'm asking. I just wanna do more. I don't know if you think we can handle it, we can't handle it. I don't know what the process is with you guys and who decides what's gonna go on these wonderful little agendas that we get. But I think I was expecting to do a lot more.

And I know there's gonna be things coming before us that I'm just, we haven't had yet. Especially talking with YouTube, there are probably so many things that we haven't even been approached with yet from here or from the public right there. But I would, at this point, just like to do more. So that's my question. For me, I'm here and my thing is for low income housing, things like that. I really want to start seeing what we can do to move the city forward and get people in homes and things like that. But how are we going to do that if there's really kind of only maybe one or two or three, one thing on the agenda that would be twelve, thirteen things we do in a year. So I'm just curious as to how that works and I just wanna do more.

I appreciate that, Commissioner Amen. And so do I. However, I've been doing this for so many years. I've learned that the wheels of government actually have a speed that is pretty consistent in that. And a lot of it has to do with staff and the politics of what can actually be done because a lot of these people are like octopuses and they got arms going out and being pulled in a lot of different directions.

And so in order to comply with legal requirements of what has to be done and what has to be put in the staff reports and how it can move forward and review of projects, time to review projects are all time consuming and from what I see we have a lot of, we have new staff, but a lot of them are green in my opinion in that and not used to Stockton's ways. And the leadership always ends up getting involved, has to be involved to keep it on track so that we follow what they're allowed by code for us to do, attorney's office involved. It just, it's the wheels of how government seems to work. We don't get what, I'm with you. There's things, and I've said it almost at every meeting, there's things I could put on the agenda and move, you know, and want them get moved forward too.

But it doesn't, all my years it doesn't work that way. And actually these guys have done a good job getting what we've gotten done in that. And they know that there's more to get done but finding the time to put it all together so that it can be presented to a body like this and follow the rules that we have to follow is always difficult. And that there's a lot that goes into it that we don't see or this body doesn't see just to get it here.

And I thank staff, you guys are wonderful answering. Mike just is wonderful every time I ask something you're like there, you have answer for me. Like I said, I'm on this side so I don't know how that side works and I'm just, come on, let's go. And so I

mean, I could add 10 things to the agenda tonight in that, that I'd like to see put on there. And I'd like to get them rolling in that. But it just, for whatever reasons, the system doesn't work that way. And I don't know that we can actually make those type of changes to make it move any faster. I mean, you can hire all the people you want.

You can have consultants that you hire to do the work. But that doesn't mean that it's gonna get done to what can actually be done, okay, in that in reality. I mean, some of that work that people do really has overseen by people that are qualified to be able to teach them on how to get it out to where we could get more agenda items. The director can add to it or tell me I'm all full of it.

Through the chair. I agree with many of the points being made. Resources and capacity are certainly involved in the pace of what is presented to the Planning Commission. But there's also, we have certain entitlements, permits, things that don't go to the Planning Commission level. They're done internally.

They're not discretionary is the term that we use. So we are very, very busy in our department, but not everything gets up to your level for your review. Further, our work assignments have to be approved by the City Manager's Office. So if a new policy, a new program, something new that the City Council or the Planning Commission wants, we have to get the approval from City Manager's Office for our work assignment because we work on other things that you don't see, right? So, but we are listening, are taking notes, we are reporting back to city manager's office of the desires of this commission and showing okay how can we do this, what's the work plan, what timing do we need.

And so it's a combination of all of that. I did want to make it clear that we have not throttled back this last year. That we're not filtering what you see. Any application that needs your review has been going to you. Any policy that needs your review we take to you.

In fact, we take things to you that are not even required to go to Planning Commission, but we want your involvement because we know that your feedback is valuable and it helps create a better product. For example, we have certain annual reviews that we do that really only needs to go to counsel, but we bring it to you first because it's part of what you do as commissioners and we value that. So we work very hard and we want to bring as much stuff, as many items to you as we can. So I do appreciate the acknowledgement that we work hard and that it is, you know, resources are always a thing. That is a reality that we work within.

But we are listening and we want to do the best that we can for this community as well. So I just didn't want you thinking that we were holding back because that's not what we're doing. But I love the energy that everybody wants to work on things. And we do have some major items coming forth that we've spoken about in the past. And I'll defer to Mike regarding some of the things that we have in the pipeline. But thank you for letting me speak.

Thank you. Anytime. Commissioner Hall.

Well, I'll go off topic. Not what I was gonna say, but I will say what the director said, a lot of the low income projects do not come to us at all. Most of the low income projects, apartments in particular, don't come to the Planning Commission. They're not required to. They could do it at staff level. The states made it a lot easier to pass those projects because of that fact. So they don't come to us. We don't get to see that, which is kind of a bummer, but it doesn't come to us. They were able to just approve those at a staff level. So that's kinda nice. I do wanna say what I was meant to say. Originally, I wanted to thank the chair, Sangonetti, for a fantastic job, your knowledge. Obviously, you were on the commission way before I was on the commission. And so you did it for a lot of years, so you bring a lot of to this. So I appreciate

Thank you.

Everything you've done this year. I wanna thank everybody for giving me the opportunity to do it again. I don't have quite his knowledge. I'll be more of a director probably, than than he is, but I appreciate that and and, just wanna thank everybody for doing that. So I didn't know if if our last commissioner wanted to say anything. Otherwise, I was gonna make a motion to to adjourn unless someone else Okay, well then I will make that my last thing and then my wishing to adjourn because I gotta hit the road.

All right, this is where I do my last one where I cast my vote as no. I'm allowed to do whatever I want. Yeah, cast your

votes. Oh, I

like to pull your legs some.

Thank you

for your circles.

Thank you. We'll be seeing you.

Again, we'll leave

you guys one of those. I don't wanna, like,

okay. Chair. Good job.

Yeah. So I'm gonna hop, like,

reel you in, but that's okay. Luck.

Good luck luck a a lot. Lot. Nobody's ever been able to real